Voting Rights Timeline By cabralG Feb 3, 1870 15th Amendment After the civil war, African Americans were set free by the 13th amendment and later considered citizens by the 14th amendment. The next step taken to create real equality between the people in the US was to allow African Americans to vote. The 15th amendment was created to allow African Americans to participate in the United States political life. Jun 21, 1915 Guinn V. US This court case helped African Americans to vote. After the 15th amendment which gave African Americans the right to vote the States responded with the Grandfather Clause which denied their right to vote. The Guinn V. US case fought against the Grandfather Clause and convicted those who practiced it to deny African Americans the right to vote. Jun 4, 1919 19th Amendment After African American males go their right to vote females felt it was their turn to speak up. So in response to that they would petition and assemble state by state to receive voting rights in America. The 19th amendment would later be made where the US can't deny voting to anyone based of sex Jun 2, 1924 Indian Citizenship Act This act gave citizenship to all Native Americans born in the US the right to vote. This was used to give everyone equality because of the Southern States who prejudicially those of color from voting. To add onto this act the government reassed the Dawes Act to give Native Americans more rights. Jun 27, 1952 McCarran-Walter Act The McCarran-Walter Act let foreigners immigrate to the United States. Through this new act, quotas would be created where only a certain amount of a specific ethnic group could enter, because of this rule it allowed them to limit certain races like Asians. Asians would only be let in groups of 2000 a year. So racial tension was still present. Jan 23, 1964 24th Amendment In response to the 15th amendment being ratified Southern states would start enforcing new rules which would prohibit the voting rights of African Americans. One of these rules was a tax pole. If a citizen could not pay their tax pole than they could not vote. So the 24th amendment was ratified to stop Southern states from preventing African Americans from voting Jul 1, 1971 26th Amendment After the Vietnam war young adults became frusturated and believed it was unfair that they were being sent out to war, but couldn't vote. In response to that the 26th amendment was ratified to allow those 18 years or older to vote Apr 20, 1993 Motor Voter Law To make regestering to vote easier for Americans to vote the Motor Votor Law was enforced. The Motor Votor Law allowed citizens to vote through mail and gave them 30 days to vote before the election. Oct 29, 2002 Help America Vote Act Signed by George W. Bush in 2002. This act was made to improve voting in the United States. This act added better equipment used for voting, Voting information, and Statewide Voter Registration Databases. This made acquiring information for the voters easier to create a higher voting turnout Nov 2, 2010 Military And Overseas Empowerment Act This act allowed militant soldiers out of state to receive absentee ballots to vote. This way they could return it on the day of the election. This act would be performed electronically to allow voting across the world so everyone's voice could be valuable.
